


the lives that rise around us

by izadreamer



Series: the long road back to home [2]
Category: Tangled (2010), Tangled: The Series (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Dreams and Nightmares, Dubious Morality, Epic Friendship, F/F, Fairy Tale Elements, Gen, Multi, OC-tober, Origin Myths, Original Character(s), Other, POV Original Character, Romance, Some Plot, Spies & Secret Agents, Tangled (2010) References, Tangledtober, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-07-23 14:04:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 17,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16160414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/izadreamer/pseuds/izadreamer
Summary: A series of independent drabbles for OC-tober, exploring the lives of my Tangled OCs and how they fit into this created universe. This is mostly just so I get a handle on these characters, but there are also glimpses and hints to people and plot points that will become important in other works of mine, most notably my ficsLabyrinths of the Heartandit's just a mild inconvenience.





	1. Morning

**Author's Note:**

> Yasmin and Ella are original OCs of mine, and actually characters from a story I hope to one day write in full and publish!! I adapted them to the Tangled world primarily because they helped ease over some plot points for future events of Labyrinths, and also as a tribute to them, as their characters and relationship was the base for Sun and Moon! Sun was based off Ella, and Moon off Yasmin. By now both Sun and Moon have grown to become their own unique characters in full, but Yasmin and Ella were the starting point.
> 
> Day 1: Morning  
> Characters of focus: Yasmin and Ella

In the dawn of early morning, the world is bright and blue. The green grasses turn gold and every cloud shines with the light of the sun; morning is a time of peace and tranquility, calm and peace, a kind start to a hopefully kinder day.

On this morning, however, one is not at peace with the rest of the world. Alone in the sunlit field, Yasmin stands on the beaten path with her hands on her hips and her eyes narrowed at the horizon. As the morning drags on her scowl deepens and festers, brows knotting over a furious gaze. Every chirp of a bird makes her flinch; every gust of wind sends her foot tapping in the dust.

When at last the sun has risen and all the world is aglow, she sighs, and her shoulders fall. Her lips purse and twist with a dark disproval.

“She is not here,” Yasmin announces to the sky. “She is not coming. Either that or she is late.” A pause, and when there is no answer, she scoffs. “She is not coming,” she says again, with more finality. “How utterly vexing."

She looks back at the blue line of the horizon, grumps under her breath, and goes troping back inside.

Ella is already at the table when she enters; the tea is bubbling and the eggs are cooking. She looks up with a smile that falters once she sees Yasmin’s face, and then falls entirely when she sees Yasmin is alone.

“Is she—"

“Not coming,” Yasmin announces, with undue gravitas. “She has left us behind and is likely rotting in a ditch, good riddance to her.”

“Oh, honey,” says Ella, and leaves the eggs to kiss Yasmin’s scowling face. “I’m sure she’s just fine.”

“She doesn’t write, she rarely visits, and now she stands me up on our yearly meeting, despite knowing full well what a fret I am; what sort of friend is that? No, I do not care, she can rot and I will laugh at her.”

Ella kisses her cheek again. “Yes, I know,” she says, and then, “I’m sorry, darling. I know you wanted to see her.”

Yasmin has nothing to say to that. She stands still in the doorway and watches with hooded eyes as Ella leaves her side to make sure the eggs aren’t burning. All at once the tension abandons her; she sighs deep and heavy, crossing her arms over her chest. “I am afraid,” she admits, and Ella hums in wordless encouragement. “She has never once missed the meetings before. Every time I hear from her at all it is ‘Yasmin, do you have what I need, Yasmin, have you found the legends I am seeking.’ I tell her, ‘I am religious, I know the stories, I have told you all that my priests have told me,’ but is that enough for her? No, never. So I find obscure stories, I find secrets and legends so old they shake even my faith. I do this for her, I find her objects and maps and answers, and now she doesn’t come.”

Ella pours tea into a cup and watches the leaves steam. “You are worried.”

“I have found such horrible stories.”

“I’m certain Adira will be fine, my love. You know what she always says.”

“That’s she’s amazing, yes, I do know, it is entirely infuriating. But this is different.”

Ella places the kettle down. “Adira can handle herself, you know.”

Yasmin presses her lips into a thin line and says nothing else for a long time, just watches the steam rise from their teacups. “I simply have a bad feeling,” she says at last. “She has asked me for something strange, she has asked for tales that frighten even me. No story with Zhan Tiri is a good story.”

At this Ella looks up. “Zhan Tiri? You told me she asked you to find stories about the Moon.”

Yasmin’s eyes are dark and distant. “Yes,” she says. “She did.”

A still silence falls between them. At last Ella sighs, and rises, taking Yasmin’s arm and gently leading her to the table. “Sit,” she says. “Drink your tea and ease your worries. She is not coming today, and so these issues are a problem for another morning.”

“We may not have time,” says Yasmin.

“Then at least we have this sunrise,” says Ella, and raises her drink for a toast. 


	2. Dystopia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had no idea what to do for this drabble, ahaha. Eventually, I went with Moon, if only because her dreams and fears are probably the most Dystopia-like I can think of at the moment. At least this time its an OC you guys may be more familiar with....? ^^; 
> 
> Day 2: Dystopia  
> Character of focus: the Moon

Moon dances in the dreaming and spins a web of fantasy. The world of dreams is her realm, and hers alone; she cannot control it, but she can shape it, and through all the millennia she has breathed and existed, she has become an expert in this craft. She draws her long fingers through the mists and dances in a fog created by another’s imagination. She spins tales of woe and tales of the bizarre and inflicts them on the unsuspecting, for no other reason than that she can. In this world of in-between, she can rest in peace, she can scheme and plan without interruption, and she can dance the way she used to: careless and thoughtless, without fear of being seen. 

Moon glides through the dreaming like a ghost. She catches nightmares and sends them on their way, she finds unformed dreams and gives them shape. She is careful, always, to keep each dream at arm’s length, gripped tight between her thumb and forefinger, pinched between her nails. She lets no dream come too close, guards her mind and her heart jealously, for the dreams she is happy to inflict on others she is terrified to inflict on herself.

But sometimes Moon slips, and her attention wanes. This moment is one of those times. She holds a dream in her fingers and coos at the nightmare inside, and does not see the reaching wisps of a wandering dream until it has engulfed her.

The world blurs, the dreaming overrun by a dream. In Moon’s surprise her hold on her heart slips, and echoes ripple out, take form and substance in the blank mist. The world changes. Her view shifts.

_She stands on an ice-barren plain, a dead land, for all the world is dead now, and she thinks, No, this is not what I wanted—_

_The monster she created rises up and smiles at her, and Moon has never feared a smile before now, and it says, Thank you for this power, and she says, I did not do it for you._

_I know. Which is why I feel no guilt in stealing the rest of it._

_She stands in a world above and separate from the moral realm below, and watches a woman cry, and she says, Why, why are you crying—_

_What have you done?_

_I? I have done nothing!_

_And then she is kneeling in the seas and looking up, meeting the eyes of her beloved Sun, beautiful and merciless, and she begs, Don’t do this—_

_You have left me no other choice._

_She stands in a field where a flower once grew, and she reaches with her power and searches, scours the land for the flower, for the Sundrop, but it is not there, she cannot find it—the Witch, she has taken the child, she has hiddenher beyond even Moon’s gaze, that last chance stolen away, and she tilts back her head and howls—_

Moon yanks herself from the dream with a gasp, flickers back into the reality. She stumbles on nothing, a hand to her heart, and in her shock she is frozen, still and silent.

The dream condenses, brightens, shining with all the echoes of her heart. It tries to flee from her, and Moon’s smile contorts to a snarl. She reaches out and digs her nails into the soft wisps, drags it back to her, forcing the dream to bed to her will. It flickers and fights and then quiets, cowed by her fury; when it returns to her it is complacent, as meek and as quiet as a mutt.

Moon takes the dream in her hand and holds it, watches as it puddles sweetly in her palm. It shines bright white with chaos and glimmers with death, and slowly, gently, with the utmost care in her expression, Moon takes her dream and crushes it down into nothing.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


	3. Punk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had no idea what to do for today, mostly because I have.... no idea what punk means. Also I'm too lazy to look it up, ahaha. But well, that lack of knowing is what ended up inspiring the drabble in the first place, so-- win for me, I guess??
> 
> Addy and Elias are original OCs for the Tangled universe, and were created for a minor but key role they'll play in Labyrinths. Also, for shenanigans. So many shenanigans.
> 
> Day 3: Punk  
> Characters of Focus: Adeline "Addy" the Potato Peeler, and Elias the Guard-in-Training

When it is midday and most of the morning’s commotion has died down, Addy goes to find Elias. This takes her far longer than it normally would; Elias isn’t at the training grounds or any of the guard posts, and when she goes to ask the Captain his red eyes and drawn expression freak her out so much she runs away without saying a word. By late afternoon, she still hasn’t found him, and Addy begins to suspect darkly that he is hiding from her. 

Too bad for Elias, because Addy knows this castle like no-one else. People don’t think much of a kitchen potato-peeler, they think her a bit dull, and so never watch what they say. Within an hour she catches the maids gossiping about a crying boy; ten minutes later a new guard is convinced a wing of the castle is haunted because “I heard wailing, sir, the most _dreadful_ kind, it’s haunted! Totally haunted! We’ll have to evacuate.”

“Calm down, man, you look like you’re about to faint.”

“But the wailing!”

Where there’s wailing, Addy knows, there’s Elias. She goes to the ‘haunted’ wing and searches the rooms until a particular loud sniffle directs her to a closet. She opens the door with a flourish.

Elias sniffs loudly, looks up, and upon seeing Addy goes white in the face. “Oh, no,” he says, and goes to say more, but then hiccups on a sob and hides his face in his hands.

“You,” Addy says solemnly, in her best Voice of Doom, “have been avoiding me.”

“No I’m not,” Elias says, and gives her a watery glare from the confines from his elbows. “I’m avoiding _everyone._ ”

“We were supposed to go exploring today. You swore. On your honor! You said that you had some cool new passages that only the guards knew—”

“I’m a guard-in-training,” Elias corrects miserably, and his face falls open in despair. “Though m-maybe I’m not even that anymore. Oh, Addy, he hates me, the Captain hates me!”

“Don’t be silly, Eli, he doesn’t hate you. He doesn’t even know your name.”

“He still hates me,” Elias says, and burrows his face into his arms. “I was talking and babbling like always and then— then he said if I didn’t have the right nerve for this job than I—I should just—”

He can’t finish. His voice breaks off and he chokes on a new wail.

Addy goes quiet, considering this crisis, then says, “Don’t take it personally! You know how he is. This whole place has been— _well._ You know.”

It’s a weak comfort, but it does the trick. Elias sniffles and wipes at his eyes. They both know the castle isn’t at its peak lately. Ever since the Princess left for the road on a mysterious journey about a month ago, the whole place has been oddly lacking. Then two weeks back, the King had gone cold and stiff, fury and fear in every action. Then, he’d gone apocalyptic. Something about a letter.

Neither Addy nor Elias knows exactly what’s gone wrong, but the whole castle has been up in arms for days. The worst is the King; second-worst, the Captain. Of course, the Captain’s always had a bit of a temper, Addy knows, but from what she’s heard, the Captain isn’t angry for the King, he’s angry _at_ the King. It doesn’t bode well, whatever it is. Not for this castle and certainly not for them.

“Don’t do this,” Addy scolds, settling down in front of Elias with a huff. He’s still got tears in his eyes, and she really doesn’t blame him, but she needs to distract him soon. The day is already half-wasted. “You can’t keep breaking down every time you get snapped at! You gotta be tough, Eli, you gotta hold steady! You gotta be—punk!”

“I gotta be— _what?”_

“Punk!”

He rubs at his eyes and squints at her. “I… I don’t think that’s a word, Addy.”

“‘Course it is,” Addy lies, pointing at him. “It’s a wonderful word. It means, uhh… expression! And courage! Punk!”

Eli blinks at her. “No,” he says finally. “That’s definitely not a word.”

“It’s a word because I say it is,” Addy announces. “Who knows? Maybe I’m just ahead of my time, _Elias._ Maybe one day in the future people will be punk, and they’ll say punk, and they’ll be punk—”

“Please stop saying ‘punk,’” Eli says.

“—and when that future day comes, I’ll rise up outta some obscure grave as a _totally punk ghost,”_ Addy says loudly, talking over him, “and I’ll scare all the other punk people by being like—" She lifts up both hands, makes a fist, and shakes it triumphantly in the air. “' _YESSSSSSSSSSS!_ After all these years! Punk _is_ a thing! _”_

“Why are you like this?” Eli asks the air, but he’s smiling now, tears dried and shoulders no longer shaking. Addy lowers her hands and grins widely at the sight, pleased at her progress.

“Because it’s funny, of course,” she informs him, and leaps up to her feet, grabbing his hand and pulling him up with her. “C’mon, Eli, there’s still some time left. Show me that passage, guard-in-training! Let’s go have an adventure!”

“It’s going to end horribly,” Elias warns her, deep regret in his voice, but his eyes are shining and his smile matches hers. He takes her hand and squeezes her palm in thanks.

Addy cackles at her victory and grips his hand back tight. Together they stumble out of the closet, down the halls and out the doors, and barrel headfirst into mystery, leaving the tears and worry behind them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, if you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


	4. Ghost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This prompt was one I've been looking forward too; it seemed like a great opportunity to flesh out some background?? Also, writing Yasmin and Ella is just.... ahhhh, it makes me so happy, ahaha. (Posting these drabbles early today because Thursday is a bit of a time-crunch.... I hope you guys enjoy!!)
> 
> Day 4: Ghost  
> Characters of Focus: Yasmin and Ella

In the late summer the winds blow cold and the fogs rise, so much so that it might as well be autumn. Coastal cities rarely have true summers, at least in these parts, and though Yasmin and Ella live further down from the city, nestled in-between a few farmhouses, and close to the edges of three fields, neither they nor the seasonal crops can really escape the chill. Outside her window Yasmin can see the farmers plowing early, checking none of their plants have died in this coming cold; when Ella sneaks a blanket over her shoulders, Yasmin does not grab it.

Ella doesn’t seem to mind this blank state. She tucks the corners of the blanket into Yasmin’s hands so that it won’t slide off and guides her gently to a chair to sit. Yasmin is complacent, following these silent instructions to the letter. She sits and she stares out her window, and only just barely remembers to hum her thanks when Ella presses a fresh cup of tea into her cold hands.

Where Yasmin is silent, Ella is restless. She checks the teapots, the cups, the blankets and the windows. She lights candles and then blows them out again, watching them smoke. Every once in a while she opens a drawer and touches a stick of incense, the last one, a faint smell of strong wood drifting from the cupboard. It has been their last stick of incense for three years now; they have never dared to light it and lose it like all the others.

At last she finds nothing else to fret with, and sinks beside Yasmin on the couch with a shuddering sigh. Yasmin hands her the cup, white ceramic blinding against Ella’s dark skin.

“I hate this,” Ella whispers.

“Yes,” Yasmin says, and brushes a small braid behind Ella’s ear so that she can kiss her cheek.

“I thought it would get easier.”

Yasmin does not answer, though in her dark eyes there is worn agreement. Thirty years, since their kingdom fell, and their home country burned. Thirty years since they fled to the sea and the lands beyond, seeking shelter with the ones who let their home fall by doing nothing. Thirty years, and the ghosts are thick as they have always been.

Thirty years, and as Yasmin takes the cup from Ella’s hand and places it on the table, interlacing their crooked fingers, she can feel the weight of each one.

“We are here now,” she says at last, having no other comfort to give. “We have this house and those fields and that silly morning fog that makes walking during the day feel like a horror story. We have this tea and those cups.” She squeezes Ella’s palm. “You have me.”

“Doesn’t mean I can’t miss what we’ve lost,” Ella replies, but some tension in her shoulders has eased, and she leans into Yasmin’s embrace. “Oh, darling. Adira should be here.”

At this Yasmin’s lips purse. “She does not like to grieve.”

“She should, though,” Ella says sadly, and closes her eyes. “Sometimes I fear she is… still there. Still holding on to that tower.”

“Our kingdom could not be saved. The people saw that long before our King heeded our cries. That tower means nothing, in the end, if all the rest has burned.”

“She misses home, too,” Ella admonishes. “There’s no harm in holding on.”

Yasmin shakes her head. “We know our kingdom is gone,” she says at last. “We keep the incense unlit and we drink tea and we speak of it. Adira never has. I wonder sometimes if she still thinks that our kingdom can be saved.” She sets down her teacup and takes Ella’s other hand, and squeezes her fingers tight.

“That is what I am afraid of, love,” Yasmin says, at last, looking out into the sky, “because if I have learned anything from these years, it is that the Dark Kingdom is now home to only the ghosts.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Yasmin and Ella, along with most of the people, fled the Dark Kingdom about five years or so before King Edmund ordered Adira and Quirin to leave. This is why their perception of the Kingdom's fall is about five years earlier.)
> 
> If you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


	5. Scars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble was a bit interesting. Sun is a character best expressed when interacting with others, I feel, so I don't think this gave her the justice I hoped it would; that said, she fits so well for this prompt I couldn't pick someone else. Well, hopefully this drabble serves as a good sneak peak!
> 
> Warning: a rather detailed description of a scar. Nothing too vivid, I don't think, but please be mindful of that!
> 
> Day 5: Scars  
> Character of focus: the Sun

It is years before Sun sees the scar, though she knows it is there; perhaps it is less discovery and more that Sun is finally ready to see it. Time moves strangely to her, but in this she is aware of it. She keeps her eyes trained on the world below in terrified anticipation, and it is only when generations upon generations have passed and the earth finally grows green again, life creeping back in to fill the scars left on the earth, that Sun finally releases her breath. 

(She does not look to the starburst bit of earth when the Moon’s blood had fallen. She does not look upon that kingdom of black rock and sheer crystal. She turns her eyes away, and for the rest of all eternity, that is the one place on earth where her light refuses to fall.

Some scars, Sun thinks, deserve to stay the way they are.)

But when the earth blooms green and bright once more, when the aftermath has finally been swept away, only then does Sun turn her attention on to her own scars. She is aware of them in a way she is aware of nothing else; she knows they are there because of the mark they have left on her. She has not been able to see right since it happened, her physical eyes now blinded and sightless. Of course, Sun has never been bound by form—she has her sunlight, her daylight glow, her fires and candles to serve as her eyes now. Yet the loss still strikes at her, for now all color has been washed away, her world constrained to light and shadow. With no eyes to see, her sight is now limited, and this loss is enough to hurt. 

Still, even with her sight cast only in terms of lights and shadow, Sun can still view her own face should she wish it. It simply takes a bit of creativity. On the day she is finally ready to face the scars, Sun flickers down to the world below. She draws her sunlight rays close to her and lets their glow dance on the water. She finds mirrors in the still waters of the ponds and puddles, and so Sun tilts her head and views herself from the eyes of another.

At first, the image is faint, blurry and uncertain; water does not function as a very steady mirror. But soon the ripples fade, and the image grows intense, and then Sun can see her scars in full.

Wide, blinded eyes; sun bright and shining, devoid of sight. A ring of dark and scarred skin encircling her eyelids. Sun can remember how the tears felt, how they rose up in her eyes and pooled there, unable to fall. Her tears had burned her eyelids and her eyes, stolen her own sight from her, and the one that had fallen—the one tear that had slipped free—

She can see it, in that sideways view: a long and pitted scar trailing down her cheek, deep and dark and gruesome. The tear, she remembers, had fallen along that path, had slipped down the curves of her face and dripped off her chin to the world below, where it hit the earth and grown to become a flower.

It does not bother Sun, not really. This outcome is to be expected. Sun is a being of light, of chaos, a bright and unfaltering joy, a voice to rattle the heavens. She is not meant for things like grief, or regret, or hatred; she is not meant for tears. For all the time she had existed, it had never occurred to her that she could cry at all, that she was capable of such painful emotion. And yet—the evidence of such a thing is clear to see, plain as the day, scarred on her visage for all eternity.

Sun is not built for grief, as her scars reveal; even she is not immune to the overwhelming power of a tear. But as she dips her dark hand to the water, letting the ripples obscure her sideways view, she cannot help but think, even now, after all this time…

It is the scars on her heart that are the worst, and despite her nature, Sun knows those wounds will never heal. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


	6. Kiss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooohh, it's been so long since I've written romance. Oh man. So fun, but oh gosh, I think I'm a bit out of practice...
> 
> Day 6: Kiss  
> Characters of Focus: Yasmin, Ella

When the boat finally docks and Yasmin steps off that gangplank to the rough wood of the port, she is so relieved she nearly buckles. Her knees are weak and her stomach hasn’t stopped roiling since she first stepped up on the damn boat, and she presses a hand to her temple and groans. Her arms ache, her throat even more; the deal had gone through without a hitch but it had taken her five hours to close the conversation. 

It is so late in the day the sky is practically black, and she accepts the captain’s lantern gratefully even as she declines his offer to stay in an inn. “I’ll be quite all right,” Yasmin informs him, when he insists she reconsiders. “I have this great burly lantern to protect me and the Moon to watch my path. I’ll be fine, dear man, I’ll be fine.”

“What sort of lady prays to the _Moon_ for safe passage?” she hears him ask his fellows, and Yasmin cackles at their confusion and marches off into the dark without another glance back.

The longer she walks the more the earth steadies her, soothes her ill stomach and eases the lingering taste of sea salt on her tongue. The night air is brisk and bracing, and Yasmin draws her coat over her shoulders and thinks longingly of her home, the small kitchen and soft chairs and knitted blankets. She thinks of that dark tea that Ella favors so heavily, sweet and strong, how the smell wafts in the corners and sticks to their clothes. She thinks of their bed, the soft sheets, the warmth of a body close by. She thinks of Ella, and keeps on going.

When at last she takes the last turn of the road to her house, the night is still and calm and silent. All the neighbors’ homes are dark and looming, not a soul awake at this early hour. But through the windows of her cottage home, she can see a glow, a faint light, a beacon calling out. The lanterns are still lit, waiting to welcome her as Yasmin knew they would be, and she opens the door with a shaking hand.

Ella is asleep, laid out on the kitchen table, her dark curls spilling across the pale wood. Her head is pillowed on her arms, her breaths soft and even. Yasmin lingers in the doorway and soaks in the warmth of home.

She places down the lantern and slips off her coat. With soft steps she pads behind her, touching gently at Ella’s shoulder. When she sees those familiar eyes flicker open, Yasmin leans down and kisses her cheek, soft and sweet. She pulls away to see Ella’s glowing smile.

“Yasmin? My love? Are you back in my arms at last?”

“Here at last,” Yasmin says into her ear, and Ella laughs, bright and joyous. Her arms rise, and she cups Yasmin’s face with sleepy hands and pulls her in for a proper welcome, a deeper kiss, something true and real and fierce with joy.

The walk was long and the night air was cold, but it is all worth it, Yasmin knows, to be in Ella’s arms once more.

She sinks into the embrace and breaths in the strong scent of tea still clinging to Ella’s skin, and smile wide against her lips.

“I missed you,” she says, and then she doesn’t say anything more, and settles in to enjoy the kiss she’s been dreaming of since the moment she left.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


	7. Sacrifice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 7: Sacrifice   
> Characters of focus: Adeline "Addy", Elias

The light of their lantern barely pierces into the gloom. The tunnel’s dark maw absorbs the glow, and the dusty air and shadowed walls turn the comforting golden glow to a bone-chilling green. A cold draft wafts from the entrance, ruffling Addy’s headscarf and bouncing Elias’s curls, like a hand touching upon their heads. 

“Well,” says Addy. “After you, Eli!” 

Elias immediately goes stiff, eyes wide and mouth agape, the lantern nearly falling from suddenly weak fingers. “W-what?”

“It’s _your_ secret tunnel entrance, my friend!” Addy says, and gleefully pushes him closer. She is terrible, and she knows it. It’s always been something Elias has admired about her. Now he abruptly regrets that. “Go, go on, guard-in-training! Strut your stuff! Make your ancestors proud!”

“I don’t even _know_ my ancestors! I’m an orphan!”

“I’m sure you have ancestors _somewhere,_ don’t be so negative. Now now, go on!”

“But—but—” He dances on his feet, the lantern swinging wildly in his grasp. “But if I go first, i-if there’s a, a monster or a ghoul or—” His mouth drops open. His shoulders shake. “I could die!” 

Addy clasps him solemnly on the shoulder. He looks desperately up into her face and sees only his demise. “That is a sacrifice I am willing to make,” she informs him gravely. Then she grins, and Elias’s heart shrivels in his chest. “Now, onwards! Adventure awaits.”

“But I don’t _want_ to die,” Elias says, only wailing a little bit. He still walks forward though, long since used to these conversations, and if his fingers are near-white on the lantern ring or clenched and trembling on his sword hilt, well, Addy is probably too occupied to notice.

“Man oh man! Look at those skulls! You see those bones? Wicked! …Eli? Elias? Hey hey hey, slow down! Why are you walking with your eyes closed? You’re missing all the broken skulls!” 

This goes on for a long while, down four passageways and three dead-ends. Elias counts each step, and thinks longingly of his safe and warm bed back home. The tunnel never changes. As always the darkness beacons them on, their pale lantern glow revealing new finds every step. Broken bones, ancient coins, moss that covers an entire section of wall. Addy oohs and ahhs at all of it, like any proper adventurer. Elias just sort of shivers.

All at once, however, their peaceful trek grinds to halt. Elias steps nervously down on a loose stone, and a click echoes throughout the room. They both freeze. Elias’s face drains of all color. Addy’s eyes go wide.

A panel in the wall slides open, and Addy shrieks.

“Eli, look out!”

The next few seconds are a blur. Addy slams into Elias, and they both go tumbling, lantern bouncing off the cobblestone and finally rolling to a stop on the moss, the candle-light flickering wildly. Addy and Elias crash into a wall and nearly fall into another corridor.

“Oh my god,” says Elias, and then, louder, for once no stutter in sight, “Addy! Addy, Addy, are you okay? Oh my god, please answer me, please don’t leave, please be okay—”

Addy’s head pops up, a smile stretching her face from ear to ear. “That was so COOL,” she shouts, right in Elias’s ear, so loud he almost drops her from both sheer surprise and overwhelming relief. “Shit, did you see me? Haha, take that, guard boy, I am a hero! Look at me go! Woo-hoo! I was like—”

“You’re okay!” Elias says, and abruptly cuts her off with a crushing hug. “Ooo-ooh my god, you’re _okay,_ oh man, please don’t… ever…” He stops, mind whirling past the last few seconds, then pulls back, staring at her with wide eyes. “You…” He breaks off, sniffling loudly, wiping hard at his eyes. “You… sacrificed yourself… for me….?”

Addy pulls away from the hug, casually brushing the dirt off her shoulder. “Aw, Eli. Yes? Obviously? Like I’d let you die before me, ohhh my god, how uncool would that be?” She stops, adjusting her scarf, then sighs heavily. “Besides. You’re like… the closest person… I have… to… _ugh,_ family, so…”

“Oh, my god.”

“Please don’t cry, Eli, no, c’mon…”

“Sorry,” he says, and rubs at his face. “Sorry, no, don’t worry.” He takes a deep breath and gives her a blinding smile, then stands, grabbing their lantern. He turns back to offer her a hand. “I’m not crying anymore!”

“Hmmm.”

He waves his hand in her face. His smile is smaller now, more sure. Something in his heart has eased. “Adventure, Addy, d-don’t you want to keep going?”

This is thankfully enough to sway her. Just like that, Elias’s best and only friend is back on her feet, deadly boobytraps and Eli’s tears forgotten. “Yes!” she says, and takes off into the shadows. “Hurry, Eli, hurry, let’s book it!”

He follows at her heels with a laugh in his throat. All at once the darkness isn’t so scary. She is there for him, she is there _with_ him, and with Elias watching her back and Addy watching his, he knows they’ll be just fine.


	8. Birds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I honestly spend most of these prompts just.... finding more creative ways to write whatever I please while pretending like it's following the prompt. I had no idea what to do for birds. I'm... I'm pretty lost. 
> 
> Anyways, for anyone who has read my fic _it's just a mild inconvenience_ also known affectionately in my mind as the "varian dies and then comes back and its hilarious" au, this drabble directly references that one. Anyone remember cryptic doctor lady? Her name is Hanna-Justine and I love her. ❤️
> 
> Day 8: Birds  
> Character of focus: Hanna-Justine

When she opens the infirmary door, the bed is empty and the clothes are gone. The candle has long since blown out, the window swinging open on its hinges. Behind her the Princess slumps, hiding her face in her hands; Hanna-Justine simply sighs and goes to latch the shutters. 

“I thought he’d stay,” says the Princess, miserable disappointment in those wide green eyes. Hanna-Justine shakes her head and says nothing. She’d suspected this, from the moment she walked in on the boy and the Princess having a shouting match only minutes after waking up. That thin whipcord snap of a boy, all biting words and angry expressions—no, she’d known from the look of him. He would never have stayed, shows of trust or not.

It is still vexing to have to deal with it, however. Healed though his wounds may be, there are other issues Hanna-Justine had hoped to address with him before he scampered off to who-knows-where. The malnourishment, for one. The possible insomnia and PTSD. Even, if she had time, a very intense and pointed suggestion the fool boy go get himself some therapy.

But now, of course not, the child has fled into the night all on his own, and left Hanna-Justine to clean up his mess. Absolutely typical. She’d hoped to be here to deal with the fall-out of what was under those bandages, especially for a child with his past. Now he will have to deal with those scars alone, and it will be all the more traumatizing because of it.

“Typical,” Hanna-Justine mutters, straightening the bedcovers sharply and fixing the crooked angle of the nightstand with a huff. “Typical, typical, typical.”

“Do you think he’ll be all right?” the Princess asks, fussing with her fingers in the doorway. She hasn’t left yet. Her eyes track Hanna-Justine around the room, but her expression is more worried than suspicious. It is almost sad. She cares far too much for that boy, especially when he clearly doesn’t show the same courtesy for her.

But, well. The gruesome death thing. Perhaps the fool boy does care; perhaps he is simply bad at showing it. It’s certainly not Hanna-Justine’s business if it is.

Hanna-Justine grunts in vague affirmation, not quite wanting to say. Oh, she doubts the boy will die, all in all—he’s gotten this far. And she suspects he’ll be running back very soon, if he’s at all attached to that poor fretful raccoon that’s been sulking about Hanna-Justine’s rented room. Still, the bandages, and the scars, and well, if the boy is lost… 

Hanna-Justine clicks her tongue and bites her thumb in thought. What an annoying situation. When the princess came to her three nights ago, begging for help because the boy wouldn’t wake up, Hanna-Justine had expected something a lot less… troublesome.

Still, she’s involved now, and she’s never left a patient hanging in her entire career, and she’s not about to start now. She turns back to the Princess and places a hand on her hips. “Tell me, are you going back to the castle?”

The girl blinks at her, bemused, then slowly nods. “Yes, I—I could delay if you think he might—?”

“No, no, he’ll have no idea how to find this place. Head back now, dear; I’ll be coming along with you.”

“Oh!” says the princess, and she straightens, looks at Hanna-Justine with wide eyes. “Oh, of course! Yes! I’ll let the guards know—”

The Princess is gone in the blink of an eye, and Hanna-Justine sighs fondly and shakes her head. She’ll have to write a letter to Yasmin about the change in plans; it's looking like she won't be going to Arendelle this winter after all. There’s a silly patient out there who needs some  _desperate_ help, and Hanna-Justine has never been the type to give up just because the patient in question likes to jump out windows.

She goes back to her rented room and begins to pack up her supplies. She’s not worried about the change in location. In fact, if anything, she is more confident about it. The boy and the Princess, from what she has seen of them, are far too similar for their own good. That boy will be back soon enough, she knows, if only because there’s nowhere else for him to go.

Birds of a feather flock together, and Hanna-Justine will be waiting.


	9. Fear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This takes place during my fic Labyrinths of the Heart, somewhere around between chapters 6 and 7. Sorta character study, I guess?? (I wrote this really late, so it might not much sense, whoops,,)
> 
> Day 9: Fear  
> Character of focus: The Moon

Moon is not afraid of the future.

It is not that Moon does not have any fears; all living things fear something, all thinking beings have one thing above all else that they look to with terror. Moon may not be mortal, but in this way she is no different from anything else—so yes, she has fears. She can be afraid.

It is not that Moon doesn’t have fears, it is that those fears have already come to pass, and so she has nothing else to be afraid of. The worst, for her, has already happened. It is the reality she is living, her nightmares and her daydreams, the history she cannot let go and cannot escape. She has already lived through her fears, and so she has nothing else to lose.

And yet, even then, Moon thinks. Even then, she cannot explain this strange anticipation, this terrible mix of emotion in her chest. The Sundrop girl is here and the final test has begun, and nothing has ever terrified or excited her more. After all these centuries of waiting, after a millennium of nothing, at last Moon has a sign. And if the girl is as Moon hopes her to be—perhaps she even has a _chance_.

Moon is not afraid. But she cannot help but be… _wary_ of the future to come. There is a rot beneath the world, an old evil finally opening its eyes once more, just as destiny intends it. This girl will be at the center of the storm—such is her fate.

But Moon cares not about fate, not really. She is not ready to trust her immortal life in that hands of a girl who might be human and could be _more._ She is not willing to sit back and let things lie. If it is Sundrop’s fate to face an awakened evil… then Moon will use her destiny to ensure her own agenda. She will help the girl, she will test her, she will make sure she is strong enough; and doesn’t such care deserve a reward?

There is always, of course, the off-chance that the girl… _isn’t_ strong enough. Isn’t enough like Sun. And Moon does not fear that option—she doesn’t, she _doesn’t,_ she refuses—but she still cannot deny the possibility. As much as she is loath to keep her world as it is, Moon is selfish enough to want her chances more. If this Sundrop girl isn’t enough, then Moon will simply find a new Sundrop. She’s sure there’s a way. Moon is creative enough. And besides, if it is this girl’s destiny to face an awakened evil, then killing her will let it sleep. Moon has no reservations. The rest of the divine world will understand and agree, even if they never admit it aloud. Even Sun will understand.

(She must. She _must._ And even if she doesn’t, she could not see into Moon’s labyrinth anyway, and so the point is moot.)

Moon does not fear death, and she is not afraid of fate. The girl will serve her purpose or she will die. If she is weak, if her drop of light is not enough… then Moon will do what she must. But if she strong—if she is enough, if she shines just as brightly as the radiant Sun that Moon still remembers so vividly… then Moon will let her live, and the Sundrop girl will finally set her world to rights.

Moon is like every other being, but in this, she has no fear. She refuses to be afraid. She must never fear the outcome, must never doubt the future, because no matter what path the dear Sundrop takes—one way or another, Moon will claim the final victory.

She will never lose to her fear again. 


	10. Cooking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 10: Cooking  
> Characters of Focus: Yasmin, Ella

Yasmin wakes up to the smell of eggs frying. She blinks open bleary eyes to a rough wood ceiling, and when she stretches out her hand it is to find empty sheets still lingering with warmth. She sighs and watches the early morning chill mist her breath into puffs of white.

She slides out of the bed, wincing when her bare toes hit the cold wood floor. She pulls up her shawl around her shoulders and ignores the ache of her joints and knees. Beyond a few gray streaks, her fifty years are practically invisible, but in return her body seems to find a new way to vex her each day.

She pads downstairs, following the smell of food. Eggs, yes, but now this close she can catch a whiff of the savory herbs Ella likes to add, mingled with a heartier smell that promises steak or ham. Rising above it all is the strong earthy scent of Yasmin’s favorite sauce.

She steps into the kitchen to find Ella bustling at the wood stove, and pads forward, sliding her arms out and around her wife’s waist. Ella hums low and leans back against her; Yasmin presses her forehead against her shoulder and breaths in the lingering scent of flowers.

“You are a tricky, tricky woman,” she says, and can feel Ella shake with laughter beneath her hands. “Waking up and slipping away to cook breakfast on your birthday when I should dote on you.”

Ella laughs openly, and her kiss is a sweet thing, pressed chastely to Yasmin’s cheek. “Forgive me?”

“You are trying not to insult my cooking by saying nothing, and failing miserably. I know what it means when you avoid a subject, dearest one.”

Ella cackles and flips the eggs. The oil sizzles and spits in the pan. “Ohh, Yasmin, I love you, but I refuse to eat charred eggs on my birthday.”

Yasmin sighs heavily into her shoulder at this, and can feel her own smile curl at her lips. “Well. There is that.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“…May I least prepare you a cup of tea, my fair lady?”

Ella thinks about it and taps her spoon against the pan. “You may,” she announces gravely, and her dark eyes shine with laughter.

“At the very least, I make wonderful tea,” Yasmin agrees, and squeezes Ella in a brief hug, lingering there and basking in her warmth.

Ella laughs and pushes her away. “Go, go,” she says, and smiles. “Brew our tea, and I will cook our food, and when we have finished dining you may dote on me all you like.”

“There will be more flowers than your pretty hands will know what to do with, “ Yasmin promises her, and slips away to the sound of Ella’s soft laughter echoing in her ears. 


	11. Fortune

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 11: Fortune  
> Character of Focus: Hanna-Justine

Hanna-Justine considers herself a simple woman, all things considered. She is a traveler, of course, which does imply one must live simply, but beyond even that, Hanna-Justine simply doesn’t have need for things. She has the clothes on her back and head-scarves for proper occasions, her religious text and a pot for boiling water, medicine and medical supplies, paper and ink. She has all she needs, and she has never quite understood the grasping need some have to want _more._

When Hanna-Justine was a younger woman, she had desired, yes. She had wanted the notoriety and power to do what she had to. She had not wanted to be barred from her tasks or her patients, she hadn’t wanted to be stopped. It perhaps wasn’t much surprise when she got branded for treason for helping enemy soldiers while her country was at war.

The soldiers died, and Hanna-Justine had fled, and had learned quite thoroughly about the cost of wanting anything. Three deaths on her hand, and at 25 that had seemed like a terribly high number to bear. Now, decades later, with all the weight of all her failures, she carries so many lives that it drags on her like a ball-and-chain.

She rests easy knowing that she has saved a thousand more.

And perhaps that is the truth of it. Hanna-Justine is a simple woman. She wants no fortune than the knowledge of knowing she has helped. She wants nothing more than to know her life and this skill has done some good. To help others, her teacher had said, is where one finds the greatest treasure. She has followed these words for all her life. They led her to help the woman who later urged her to be a spy, led Hanna-Justine to the most remote places in the hopes of bringing a smile on an ill man’s face, led her to Corona and Arendelle and all the lands beyond. Never give up on people, her teacher had once said. Be their advocate. Help and heal people and never leave them behind, and you will see the most precious treasure in the world, and yours will be the richest fortune.

Happiness is worth more than gold, her teacher had liked to say, though sometimes gold can help with happiness. She has carried these words with her everywhere she goes.

Hanna-Justine does not want riches or gold. She merely wants to do what she has been taught, to do what her teacher once loved—making people smile, helping them get better, giving them an easier road to happiness. She has the weight of a million failures on her shoulders, yes, but she has something else too—the memory of the brightest treasure and greatest fortune in the world, the hope and happiness on their faces and the knowledge it exists because someone, somewhere, cared.

Hanna-Justine is a simple woman, and she is content with her fortune.  


	12. Fight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 12: Fight  
> Character of Focus: Elias "Eli" (the guard-in-training)

Elias knows he’s a coward.

No one ever quite calls him that to his face, of course, but for all of his fears and uncertainties, Elias is clever enough to know what they are thinking. They don’t think he’s enough, that he’s worth it. They don’t understand how he got into training or why he wants to be a guard at all when every time his fingers wrap around a hilt they go shaky and weak.

Elias cannot explain it to them. He has always been afraid; he is hard pressed to find a time when he isn’t. Perhaps when he is with Addy—Addy has always made Elias feel brave. But the facts are that Elias is just plain terrified at all times, and he knows it.

He can’t say when this fear came about, not really. Emm, the oldest of his siblings and thus the one running the household, says its because he still remembers their old home, the old country, and that when they fled the violence, what little Elias saw behind him probably scarred him for life. Then Emm will reach out to pinch his nose and say, “Or maybe you were just born a wuss, Eli,” and laugh at the face he makes. He still isn’t sure which theory is right.

It doesn’t matter, though. Even if some part of him still sees the old country, like Emm claims, Elias cannot remember that home, or those parents, or that place. His earliest memories are here in Corona. His house is settled in this country’s streets and his voice melds to their sing-song language and his clothes are sewn with their crest. Refugees, yes, but still Coronan. Emm always talks about the old country, but this is the kingdom that took them in, and this is the only home Elias has ever remembered.

So he picks himself up, again and again. He teaches himself to hold his sword until his fingers only tremble at the handle instead of shake. He forces himself to speak even when terror climbs up his throat, and he stays on the guard even when the practices and training and insults weigh him down and send him into tears. He keeps on going and smiles when Addy asks him, only half-joking, why he’s in the guard instead of peeling potatoes in the kitchen with her. 

“I’m scared of all the knives,” he tells her, only half-honestly, and she says, “Elias, you are holding a sword. At this very moment. A big-ass grown up knife, swords. I just want you to know that,” and he smiles at her, a crooked smile, and cannot quite bring himself to tell her the truth: that Elias is trying to be brave, every day, trying to be better, in the hopes that one day he will be brave enough to stand with the other men and woman and people who wear Corona’s crest and defend her from their enemies.

And one day, he thinks, watching Addy laugh and tease, one day maybe he’ll be brave enough to tell Addy this, too. Because for all that Elias is a coward, even he wants to fight to protect his home. And he’ll do absolutely anything—even face being afraid for the rest of his life—if it means having that chance.

He’s scared to death, but he’s still got fight in him, and Elias hopes with all his heart that it will be enough. 


	13. Warm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 13: Warm  
> Characters of Focus: Adeline "Addy", Elias

The kitchen fumes are starting to choke her, Addy thinks. She had suspected this for a while, and now she is becoming certain. She has been here too long. The water is pruning her hands and the repetitive work is cramping her fingers and if Addy stays here for another second longer then the hot soup air is going to boil her alive and cook her right through, and she’ll drop dead in the pantry and they won’t ever find her body, they’ll never remember her, she’ll die and she’ll infect the whole castle if she doesn’t get out _now, right now now now._

The head cook doesn’t seem very impressed with this grisly fate when she tells him. Even the on-hands-and-knees paired with some watery-eyes and pathetic-pleading tactics yield her no results. He just waves her back to her station and hands her a sharper cooking knife. “Peel those carrots, girl,” he tells her. “And the the potatoes. The king is in enough of a mood as it is, and I’d hate to see his reaction to a pot pie without carrots.”

“Anyone who likes carrots is treasonous and should be smited,” Addy informs him promptly, but goes back to peel the carrots. And the potatoes. And then the apples for the dessert.

Sometimes being the kitchen helper and official peeler is very nice. She gets paid well, lives in the servant’s quarters in the castle (nicer than most inns, Addy would know), and she never has to do too _much_ work, which is wonderful. It is, however, less wonderful in times like these.

Damn the king, anyway, Addy thinks, grumpily dragging her knife through the potato skins. It’s bad enough his temper tantrum has irritated the Captain of the Guard and upset Elias by proxy, but now it is starting to affect Addy’s free time, too. What on earth could get a man so riled up? It’s just a letter, if the gossip is to be believed, or worse— _lack_ of a letter, which just seems silly. Plenty of people don’t get letters. Addy has no idea why the king thinks he’s sooooooo special.

“Oh, dear,” says Elias, when he comes to visit her. Usually it is Addy going to visit him, but ever since the _event_ , the guards have had a shorter training sessions and everyone else has had longer everything. Addy doesn’t appreciate the change in pace. “Oh Addy, you look like you’re melting!”

“I think I am,” Addy informs him, deep regret oozing from her voice. She tugs at the edge of her headscarf and blows out an explosive sigh. “It’s sooooo warm, Eli. So warm. I’m becoming soup.”

His eyes go wide. “Please don’t become soup! I’ll have no one to talk to!”

Addy leans over her workstation table and puddles on the old wood, letting the half-peeled potato roll dramatically from her fingers. “I’m so sorry, my friend… the air… this world… it’s draining me…” She gropes blindly for his hand. “I’m… I’m fading from this world… dear Elias… would you take my final words?”

Her eyes are closed, so she can’t see him, but she hears him giggle. “Aw, Addy.”

“I’m dy- _ing,_ ” Addy says. “Don’t mock my pain.”

“I know what will cheer you up!”

“Leaving?” Addy asks hopefully. “Water? Another unscheduled snowstorm?”

“Don’t joke about that, it was a crisis.”

“It was a crisis _months_ ago, Eli, and therefore its fair game.”

“It’s really not,” Elias sighs, and carefully pries her peeling knife from her hands and places it on the work table. “But no. I have, um… an adventure? Mystery, I guess?”

Addy lifts her head.

“A clue,” Elias decides. “I have a clue. You know how the king, and the castle has been… well…”

“Bonkers?”

“ _Yeah._ Well, um, I heard the captain mention something—about, y’know, that boy? The one everyone says attacked the kingdom?”

Addy sits up straight. “You mean—?”

“I think he’s involved, somehow.”

Addy is starting to grin. “Is he still here? In Corona? The dungeons?” 

Elias looks nervous. “Maybe…? I, I don’t know, no one ever _talks_ about him, so…”

“We’ll have to _check,_ ” Addy breathes out, and leans over to clasp his hands. “Oh, Eli! You’re a genius! The dungeons! We’re going to explore the dungeons!” She’s practically bouncing in her seat. “And the dungeons are cold!”

He smiles at her, and only startles a little bit when Addy jumps up to her feet, dragging him with her. “Now,” she says, speaking quickly. “Now now now, let’s go now, when it’s busy and everyone’s distracted!”

It is perhaps a testament to Elias’s own exhaustion that he doesn’t even try and fight her on this. “Okay,” he says instead, and they leave at once, sneaking out the back doors. The oppressive heat of the kitchen at their backs, Elias’s hand warm in hers. Mystery to be found in the future.

Addy cannot wait to see what they find. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Most of these drabbles are fun, silly things. And then sometimes we have plot. ;)


	14. Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 14: Magic  
> Character of Focus: Yasmin
> 
> Notes: The drabble in particular will tie heavily into future chapters of Labyrinths, including the upcoming Chapter 9.

The libraries in Arendelle are known for many things—grand design, a great number of books, and a surprising amount of free access to education. This one in particular is rather run down, however—rickety wood walls and towering unofficial mountains of withering tomes. Outside the latched windows, a classic Arendelle winter howls outside, rattling the thin walls and making the deep stone fireplace shiver, light dancing off the walls. The bookkeeper is asleep at his desk, and Yasmin has been here so long that her candle has almost burned down to a stub. 

She turns a withered page with delicate fingers, the parchment crumbling and worn beneath her touch. Her dark eyes are lined with stress and exhaustion, hair frizzing out of her usual tie. As she reads, she mumbles softly, speaking under her breath.

“‘You want magic, you look in Arendelle,’ she says, ‘Arendelle will give what you need.’ Where is what I need, dearest? Forty tomes and I have found only dust.” Yasmin turns another page. “Hanna-Justine, you old coot. Never liked magic much in the first place, and now you send me on this goose-chase. No, no. Wrong person. _Adira._ Damn you, Adira, for sending me on this quest at all. ‘I trust you to find me what I seek.’ Hah!” Another page turn. “Maps through the Forest of No Return? Easy. Magical amulet? I have a man for that. But this? Damn, old fool. I should never have agreed to help you. Months of searching, and now I am stuck in boring old Arendelle, looking up boring old magics, hoping to find some boring old—”

All at once, Yasmin goes quiet. She sucks in a small breath and rests her hand on the page. Beside her, the candlelight flickers. The parchment is old, stained yellow with age, dark ink aged to pale brown. Her fingertips brush the crumbling words and a smile curves her lips.

Beneath her hand, the page shines in the light. Words of magic, words of truth, legends of old religions and older shrines. And there, inked with careful precision, is a drawing of a woman—beautiful and radiant, eyes closed and hair like sunlight, a whittled stone held in her fist.

“The crystal flutes of the Sun,” Yasmin murmurs, “echoes of her eternal song.” She reads over the words again and smiles. Outside the door, the storm howls. The windows shake. Yasmin is silent, focused, intent. She closes the book and sets a gold coin on the sleeping bookkeeper’s desk, and walks out with the little-worn book settled deep in her pocket, already mapping out her next destination.

The library with its mysteries and its magics—all this, she leaves behind her, and the door swings shut with a solemn thud.


	15. Memory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sun and Moon were in love, once.
> 
> Day 15: Memory  
> Characters of Focus: Moon and Sun

The worst part is the memories left behind. Moon cannot escape them. She cannot outrun them. They haunt her heels and tangle in her thoughts, whisper in her ears and sneak their way behind her eyes. She sees the fading glint of the rising sun on roiling seas and recalls the way Sun’s eyes would shine when she smiled. The heat of human fires brush at Moon’s skin and she remembers how it felt to be beside her, beside Sun, that endless warmth of her skin and soul and joy. She remembers the way that warmth lingered, the way even Moon, stone-cold all the way through, felt as if some seed of light had nestled within her, leaving her secure and content. She hears the wind rustle through the trees and whistle through crystal caves, and for a moment the wordless song holds an echo of Sun’s soft voice. 

The memories haunt her, and even time cannot erase them. Light and warmth and a song, once hers, and now lost to Moon for eternity. She cannot escape it. She hears the whisper of Sun’s roaring laughter in the land of dreaming and sees that familiar bold smile in the corner of her eyes. She is gone, gone forever; she is everywhere Moon looks. 

Moon tries to outrun the memories, but the truth always catches up to her eventually. She hides in her labyrinth and thinks of sunlight. She looks down on the earth and remembers how it shone under Sun’s light. Moon dances alone on the ocean waters, and remembers the songs she once danced to, and the woman, radiant and glorious and the only being Moon ever loved, who once sang them for her. 

When she opens her eyes the memories fade, but the echoes remain forever. 


	16. Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brief warning, this drabble addresses the fall of the Dark Kingdom, so... beware mentions of death, starvation, generally a bad situation all around kinda thing. Brief though! This is meant to be a hopeful drabble.
> 
> Day 16: Family  
> Character of Focus: Yasmin

Yasmin is not the first to leave, but she is the first to mention it. Her uncle laughs and shakes his head when she tells him so, thumbs his hands through her hair and calls her a fool. His hands shake constantly now, and the wells are dry, and the crops won’t grow. Still, he says, “This is our home, our kingdom, our city,” as if this should be enough, and for a while, Yasmin tries to believe it is. So she is not the first to leave, though she is the first to think it, and as the months pass and neighbors start to vanish, she watches them go with longing in her heart. 

She stays, even then. Yasmin is loyal to her family.

But then her uncle dies, and the rocks are more frequent, and suddenly now more people are dying every day. Rocks, disease, starvation. Whole villages decimated in weeks, in days. So Yasmin buries her uncle with all the others and finds Dante among the ruins. Her friend, her brother, her other half. She finds him kneeling at a grave and takes his hand. His eyes are empty and she knows, then, what she must do.

 _Our home,_ her uncle had said, but their home has become a ghost and it is killing them.

“We’re leaving,” she tells Dante, the last of her family, and he raises his head and looks at her for a long time. Empty eyes and a blank face. It used to be he could smile.

“Okay,” he says, in that lifeless way of his, in that voice worn and thin. She tries to remember the sound of his laughter, but the memory rings hollow. His hands are cold. Yasmin knows herself well enough to recognize that she is the exact same way.

They are mirrors, two halves of a whole, echoes of a single reflection. Yasmin and Dante, bound by something greater than blood. Both of them hollow, both of them broken, but of the two Yasmin is better at pretending.

So she pretends, as best she can, because broken does not mean ready to die. She buys them passage with another family, and Dante stands still and silent by her side the whole time, eyes haunted. She hates the look in his eyes. She hates that she listened to her uncle. She hates King Edmund and all his pretty lies, his Brotherhood and empty promises, the false hope they give the people even now, even after all is lost. If Yasmin had known beforehand of the ruin that would strike them, of the lies their King spoke, perhaps she could have left before this dead land fell and took them all with it.

They escape the Dark Kingdom on the eve of the winter season with five other families, all of them packed like sardines in a stolen cart, sneaking across the borders. Mothers, fathers, children. Closest to them is a family of four siblings, all clustered together, no parents in sight. The eldest of them is Yasmin’s age, barely 20, with wiry hair and wide dark eyes that stare off into the dust. Her name is Elmira, and when she doesn’t tend to her siblings she sits with them and watches the horizon. She is the only one in the whole cart who still speaks with a smile.

“There’s a doctor,” Elmira tells Yasmin one day, with her ruined voice. She sings, Yasmin knows. She sings to her siblings and the other passengers and to the sky. She’s sung so much her voice is hoarse. “Out there, in the country. She’s been helping those of us that get out. Sick bodies and sick souls.” She reaches out and touches Dante’s face. Yasmin does not stop her. Beautiful Elmira, unwavering and dry-eyed, watching the world burn around her. She startled Dante into laughing just yesterday, and Yasmin nearly cried at the sound of it.

“The doctor will help,” Elmira says now, and takes Dante’s hand and Yasmin’s hand and holds them both tight. “She’ll help. It’s a better world out there. I’m certain.”

“It’s a lonely world,” Yasmin tells her, because she has never believed in good things.

Elmira just smiles, and squeezes her hand tight. “No,” she says. Her eyes are bright and her hair coils around her face. She is the most lively thing here, Yasmin thinks. She burns so brightly, even in this dead land. Yasmin could love Elmira forever just for that.

“No,” Elmira says, and even Dante lifts his head at this. Still and silent Dante, Yasmin’s other half, finally awakened by the fire in Ella’s voice. “It won’t be lonely. I promise it won’t be lonely. You’ll have each other.”

They don’t answer. Elmira grips Yasmin’s hand tight.

“And,” Elmira says finally, “if nothing else, then you’ll have me.”

“You,” Yasmin whispers. She curls her fingers around Elmira’s hand. 

“Me,” Elmira agrees, and smiles the smile of a fond older sibling. “And, of course, my three obnoxious carry-ons. Our families are so small now, aren’t they? I don’t like it. So then, I’ve decided, you are a part of my family. Now and forever. If you’d like.”

Yasmin can feel tears burn in her eyes, and it astounds her. Yasmin does not cry. She didn’t cry when her uncle died or when Dante’s eyes went dark, but now the tears rise, hot and prickling, beading on her lashes. “Yes,” Yasmin whispers, and clutches Elmira’s hand tight. “Yes. Of course. Yes.” And then— “Thank you, Elmira.”

“Please,” Elmira says, and in this dead and dying world, her smile is like the sun. “Call me Ella.” 


	17. Music

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 17: Music  
> Character of Focus: Elmira "Ella"

The backstage is a blur of noise and motion, a stampede in progress. People rush to and fro, behind and before her, all of them focused on the singular task of making sure all is arranged. One woman tugs at Ella’s shining golden dress, sleek and shimmering; another pins back her tight coils of hair, exposing her face in full. Ella stands carefully still and lets them fuss without comment, eyes distant and humming gently under her breath. She goes through the musical scales and then goes through them again. 

At her side, Dante shuffles on his feet and laughs under his breath. “Don’t you go spacing out before a show, now,” he tells Ella, his pale eyes warm and amused. He presses a wooden cup in her unoccupied hands with a playful grin, clear liquid sloshing in the cup. “Here I came all this way to see you, and now you’re threatening to fall asleep onstage!”

Ella blinks from her doze and shakes her head. “I would never,” she protests, and takes the offered cup of honeyed water with a grateful smile. “I promised you a show, and I’ll deliver one.” 

“You’d better,” Dante says, laughing. He rocks back on his heels, hands linking behind his back. “All Yasmin does is send me letters detailing on and on about how absolutely wonderful you are; I’ll feel terribly cheated if I watch you walk out on that stage and just snooze.” 

Ella smiles in her cup and doesn’t comment, trying not to laugh at him. Times like these she can see the resemblance between Yasmin and Dante clear as day. They have the same way of speaking, the same cadence, and it makes Ella smile to still hear it, even now after months of separation.

“Please, Dante,” she says, handing back the now empty cup to her brother-in-law. “I am a _professional.”_

He laughs at her, head thrown back and face open with sheer delight. “Course, of course! Forgive me for the insult.” He gives a theatrical little bow. “I’m afraid I shall have to leave you, dear lady, and find my seat so that I can witness your stunning performance to the fullest!” His head tilts up and he winks at her, and the teasing drops from his voice. The warmth remains. “Break a leg, sister dear!”

He vanishes behind the curtain without waiting for a response, and Ella shakes her head fondly, smiling to herself. He’s gone to find Yasmin, no doubt about it—Ella can already imagine her wife’s complaining about Dante’s antics. He’s probably sneaking up on her at this moment. Ella can practically hear Yasmin’s shriek of surprise now.

She massages her throat and hums again, preparing. The people are scurrying away, preparing to draw back the curtains. Her hair is finished, her makeup pristine. There is a song on her tongue and a memory in her heart. This first song is from the Dark Kingdom—the song Ella always starts her shows with. Yasmin cried the first time she heard it, and Ella suspects Dante will be much the same. She hopes he enjoys it regardless.

There is a hush falling over the crowd, the stage almost clear of workers now. In the distance, Ella can hear a familiar yelp and then furious cry of a beloved wife startled by mischievous brother. She folds her hands in front of her and grins to herself. 

The curtains draw back and the stage glows with light. Ella smooths her hands down her dress, steps forward, and waits for the music to start.

The melody rises up, crystal clear in the sudden silence. The music of her lost homeland swells up around her like a wave. Ella closes her eyes and starts to sing.

Her voice rings out clear and true, and the music sweeps her away. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I've mentioned before that Yasmin and Ella are actually originally from an original story of mine; Dante is another carry-over from that. He's sort of like... Yasmin's platonic soulmate, I guess you could say?? Anyways, he's not super important in the grand scheme of things, and especially not in Labyrinths.... but I love him, so, here he is!! 
> 
> Ella is a professional singer/musician. She is actually the main "breadwinner" for her family; Yasmin's job, while important, rarely results in consistent pay.


	18. Dance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 18: Dance  
> Character of Focus: The Moon

The Moon is a dancer.

She has always danced; that is the way of this world. She is a being of contrasts. If the Sun is light, then Moon is dark. If Sun is revealing, then Moon is deception. Chaos versus order, fire versus water, heat versus cold, words against action. Sun acts, and Moon reacts. Sun fights, and Moon hides. Sun finds, and Moon protects.

Sun sings, and Moon dances. Opposites in everything but their love for music, and for all that they had been created to oppose one another, once upon a time they had found a compromise. A song and a dance and a promise. 

Now the dance is different. There is no music for Moon now, no song for her to dance to. But it is in her nature, and so, she dances—even if it means dancing alone. 


	19. Trapped

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We're finally digging in to the plotty drabbles!! Prepare for weird happenings, backstory, and a lot of set up...
> 
> Day 19: Trapped  
> Characters of Focus: Adeline "Addy", Elias

“Is this it?” Addy whispers.

Elias nods back, utterly silent. In the darkness his eyes are wide and bright, dark and reflective like new pennies. His fingers twist in front of his chest like he’s trying to tie them into knots. “Yeah,” he whispers back. “That’s… the door to the isolated cell wing. I mean, um, I think it is?”

Addy bounces on her heels, lantern held high above her head. “And the cell? With the boy? It’s in here?”

Elias gives an uncertain nod. “Mmm.”

Addy bounces again. “ _Yes,”_ she says. “Ohh, man, I’m so excited! A criminal, our age! What is he like, do you know? An asshole? Bitchy? Do you think he tries to swear like an adult? Does he say fuck?” Her eyes are shining. Her grin stretches wide. “Ohh, man. Do you think— is he _angsty?_ ”

“I don’t care,” Elias says, and his voice has gone oddly steady, strangely cold. “He’s a bad person either way. I just want answers.” The uncertainty returns again, his courage faltering. “I mean, if he has anything to do with what’s happening in the castle…”

Addy hums under her breath, but doesn’t comment. She’s forgotten—Elias wouldn’t like the boy-criminal. The boy’s monster had nearly killed Elias’s eldest sibling Emm last spring during the attack on the castle, and his littlest sister had broken her arm trying to run away from the shadowy beast. He’s not doing this for the same reason as Addy is—he’s not looking for adventure.

The reminder eases her excitement, and Addy sighs, mollified. “Come on then,” she whispers, nudging Elias’s side. “Answers are just ahead!”

Elias peeks at her from underneath his lashes and sighs. “Yeah,” he mumbles, and for once he takes the initiative, pushing open the door, revealing the row of silent solitary cells stretching out beyond them. “Last I heard, he’s supposed to be in the end row of solitary, so…”

Addy nods, creeping down the hall, following in Elias’s wake. He takes the lead, checking cell numbers and counting under his breath. At last he stops, and points at a locked wood door, drawing in a shaking breath. “Its… its that one. There.”

“Ooooh,” Addy says, and grins at him. “Wanna go first?”

The look on Elias’s face clearly says _no,_ but then his grip firms on the sword hilt and his expression settles. “O—okay,” he says, and then he fast-walks to the door and shoves it open, the hinges squeaking badly at the abuse.

Addy follows close at his heels, peeking into the cell room. It’s small— a thin sliver of room for guards and visitors, with the majority of the stone room sectioned off by intimidating iron bars. The dim glow of her lantern makes it hard to see, and she holds her breath, peering down in the dark corners. Is he there?

The light shines into an empty room. There is no boy on the cot, or by the window, and even in the darkest corners…

Nothing.

Addy stops, straightening upright to her full height in her surprise. “He’s… not here.”

Elias’s eyes are wide. “I—I don’t understand, did they move him? I thought… there’s no official records of him—”

He never gets the chance to finish. In their distraction, they forget to pay attention, and the heavy wooden door abruptly slams shut with a mighty bang at their backs. Elias jumps in the air, visibly biting down on a scream; Addy nearly drops the lantern.

“Oh, no,” Elias whispers.

“You think someone heard that?”

He doesn’t seem to have heard her. His hand clutches at her shoulder. “Addy,” he says. “Addy, the doors—on solitary—they bolt automatically.”

She stares at him. He stares back, horror real and vivid in his eyes, and she sucks in a sharp breath.

“Shit,” Addy hisses, and rushes to try the handle. It doesn’t budge-- the door has bolted, just as Elias feared. Behind her, Elias gives a low cry of dismay.

They are trapped in the cell, and neither of them know how to get out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've always been interested in how Corona views Varian. My guess is?? Not very well. I imagine there was a lot of injuries/indirect harm he inflicted on them during his stints in the finale, and that... would leave a pretty nasty mark. Poor Elias, being a guard-in-training, probably got a front row seat to all the horror.


	20. Mermaid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If "sweet" was the most difficult drabble for me on the Tangled-tober side of things, then this one kicked my ass for Oc-tober.... Sun is just--way too hard to write on her own. She is a literal people-person. _She really needs to talk to someone, dang it_....
> 
> Day 20: Mermaid  
> Character of Focus: Sun

It is not in Sun’s nature to play favorites. 

There are many creatures in the earth, Sun knows; she has looked down over all of them for generations. There is something to find and love in each of them, and so, Sun is not one for picking preferences. The most beautiful of beings, by what standards? The funniest joke— what about, and when? Context, Sun has come to find, matters the most. Context shifts all favorites. It is better to love it all, Sun thinks, and forget about ranking them entirely. 

But even with this philosophy in mind, Sun knows which beings on the earth are her favorite. Context matters, after all, and in the context of Sun’s own heart and mind she cannot help but play favorites this once. She is a being beyond mortal comprehension, but she is still a _being,_ still has a heart and mind, and hearts and minds are weak to emotion. 

Sun is no exception to that. 

Of all the creatures she has seen, Sun likes mermaids the most. They are human, and like most humans they play and create and invent, and it is a delight to watch them grow. But they are also _not_ human— they are beyond that, or perhaps it better to say, they are beside it—human in some aspects, magical in the other. Their nails can cut stone; their voices could piece the ears of any land-dweller. They live beneath the waves, and Sun will look through her sunbeams constantly for any glimpse of her favorites. They sing and dance and cry, and leave sea glass in their wake. She loves to see them. She loves most of all to see them happy. She is weak to emotion, after all, and these people are her favorites. They love, they live, they cry. They just like every other living creature, except their tears create treasure.

Sun sympathizes with mermaids. Her tears are also considered a treasure. And just like them, her tears too come from something terrible.

Favorites, after all, depend on the context. 


	21. Nature

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plot!! *winky-face
> 
> Day 21: Nature  
> Characters of Focus: ???

In the deepest dungeons of Corona, a prisoner leans their head back against the icy stone. Their eyes are closed, breathing labored. They whisper under their breath, the feverish ramblings of one halfway to dreaming. “I’ll get out,” whispers the prisoner, and instead of desperation, their voice is thin and barbed with old hatred. “I’ll get out. They can’t keep me here forever.”

 _ **They have left you to rot** ,_ the fire says. **_They have forgotten you,_** says the wind.

“Doesn’t matter,” the prisoner says. “They’ll regret it. They’ll all regret it.”

 ** _Will they?_ ** asks the creaking prison door. **_Look at you, locked in this cage. What can you do?_**

“They’ll come for me. They must. They’re useless without me.”

**_Are you sure?_ **

The prisoner doesn’t reply. Their breath quickens, rapid with growing fury. Their hands are chained before them, and beneath the solid iron cuffs, thin white fingers clench tight enough to draw blood.

**_They’ve left you. Weak-willed little rats. You offered them something greater and they ran at the first sign of trouble._ **

The prisoner grits their teeth. In the darkness, their eyes shine an unnatural green, a fire not of this world. “They left me behind,” the prisoner murmurs, and hatred festers in their hoarse voice. “Those little _rats.”_

**_They don’t deserve you._ **

“They don’t deserve me.”

**_They are weak._ **

“They were _weak.”_

 ** _You will get out,_** says a voice from the darkness, and the prisoner says, “I will get out.”

**_And though weakness is in their nature…_ **

The prisoner smiles. Their eyes burn green, and the air ripples with something like a laugh. They do not notice it. They do not see the fire flicker, or the shadows flee. Their gaze is locked on something greater, a promise that sinks in their bones and boils in their blood.

“Weakness,” says the prisoner, “is not in mine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This drabble is interesting, as the "OC" in this case is an OC the way Sun and Moon are OCs... they have a canon basis, but their character/personality is my own original take. So, uh... take of this what you will.


	22. Hideaway

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 22: Hideaway  
> Character of Focus: Yasmin

It is not often that Yasmin finds herself searching at home for legends she already knows by heart. Normally for this task she must travel, and travel far. But the thing about being asked about the myths of Sun and Moon—about _all_ of the myths of Sun and Moon—is that things tend to intersect. They meld, they mix, they appear over and over. Which means the legends she discovers and the legends she knows by heart—well. Yasmin must know them all, every detail, and no human being can recite every word of those lengthy stories from memory.

Which is why she is here now, digging through the dust and dirt like a madman. She had put the book away when she first moved into this house with Ella, and has never yet had the urge to unearth it until this moment. The boxes are piled high and the dust is aggravating, and Yasmin is lost in a maze of her own things.

She mutters under her breath and shoves balefully at a box of Dante and Allen’s old clothes, tailored shirts and stiff vests piled high in a barrel. Behind that she finds stacks of old papers: a world map, a list of items, copied prayer songs from the Dark Kingdom. Old things, but alas, not the old thing she is looking for. She places them gently to the side and keeps on searching.

She has hidden it well, of course; for years Yasmin and Ella had no intention of drawing attention to the fact they were from the Dark Kingdom. Yasmin had taken those damning items and shoved them deep into the darkest hideaway she could find. She had thought then that this would be the end of it, so it just figures that nearly thirty years later Adira would come along and ask this of her. 

Yasmin mutters another insult under her breath and pushes the final box away with a grunt. In the deepest, darkest corner, buried beneath the barrels— a box, dark wood and iron locks, hidden away in the fringes. Yasmin grips the iron handles and tugs it free, loose dirt from the basement walls raining down her head. She runs her hands over the rough wood and sighs. The box is peeling and splintered beneath her smooth hand.

She takes her key and unlocks the chest, lifting the lid to reveal ancient history. Curved tattoo needles and the specially-made dark ink for the Brotherhood mark—Adira’s things, long since given and long since locked away. Her uncle’s old candle holder and brass iron bracelets, a tattered recipe for a Dark Kingdom national dish, a small religious idol of a woman. The folded worn tapestry of Yasmin’s faith, depicting of two gods, foreheads pressed together and hands interlocked—Sun and Moon, together in harmony. Yasmin runs her fingers along the markers of her past, picks up the one item she needs, and then closes the lid tightly shut. 

She locks the chest and pushes it back beneath wall, hidden away once more. She shoves everything back into place, and once the hideaway has vanished beneath the piles of useless things once more, Yasmin turns and walks away, leaving the basement behind her. 

In her white-knuckled grip, _The Tales of Sun and Moon_ goes with her. 


	23. Cold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 23: Cold  
> Characters of Focus: Addy, Elias, and ???

Her breath fogs in front of her face, frost biting at her bare cheeks. Addy rubs at her arms, trying to scrub warmth in her numbed skin. Her layers are too thin—the kitchen heat has always encouraged thinner dress, and she is regretting it now. At least, Addy thinks, sitting against the wall of the cell, at least she still has her headscarf. She can see Elias’s ears turning blue from across the room; not an issue for her! 

“I can’t believe you locked us in here,” Addy says, not for the first time, and sags against the wall. “Absolutely unforgivable, Elias.”

Elias sniffs hard. For the first two hours of being trapped, he’d been convinced the guards would find them immediately, and had just about hyperventilated himself into a full-blown teary meltdown. He’s much calmer now, which Addy is relived for; she can never bring herself to tease Elias when he cries like that, and it is awful to watch. The glare he gives her is watery and weak and far preferable to tears. 

“I didn’t know the door would close,” Elias says, scrunching up his nose. He sniffs again and rubs at his face, breath fogging in the icy air. The sun set ages ago, and the night-time chill is seeping into their bones. Addy hopes with mournful gloom that she at least makes a beautiful ice statue when they finally find their frozen corpses. Mystery criminal-boy is definitely not worth this chill. “I thought they’d find us already.” 

Addy wrinkles her nose. “Empty cell,” she concludes mournfully. “I’ll betcha they won’t even think to check.” She tilts back her head. “Though, there’s that morning guard shift, right? Maybe we can scream and yell then. They might hear us.” 

Elias goes a bit white in the face. “Um.” 

“Fine, then we freeze.” 

He bites his lip and fiddles with his fingers, saying nothing. 

Addy sighs heavily with exaggerated annoyance, and flips so her back is on the ground, legs flat against the wall. The blood is rushing to her head; it’s a warm and dizzying feeling. She kind of likes it. 

Addy closes her eyes, savoring the spin, and that is when she hears it.

It’s not a voice, not really—barely a whisper. Just below them, through the stone and iron grate. A murmur of low voices, but something about it…

“I really didn’t mean to get us—” Elias starts, but Addy raises a hand, making a silent motion for him to shush. He does, blinking at her, bewilderment in his copper eyes. Addy gives him a wide grin and points at the floor, and then leans down flat against the icy stone, covered ear pressed against the rock. A moment of hesitation, and then Elias joins her. 

The voice is faint, faded, soft and whispery. She can’t really tell the gender. They almost sound as if they are talking with someone, and Addy squeezes her eyes shut tight, trying to listen— 

**_…They have forgotten you._ **

Addy’s smile falls. 

That… doesn’t sound like a voice. Not a regular voice. Barely a whisper, and yet— she can’t understand it. It doesn’t sound right. Distorted and strange, and yet—

She meets Elias’s eyes. He isn’t sniffling anymore. His pupils are pinpricks and his breathing is fast.

Slowly, Addy places her ear to the floor again. Faint whispers and hissed words of a conversation she can only catch snatches of, and yet— 

Addy lies there on the cell floor, listening to a soft voice and the unearthly whisper that answers, and feels her blood run cold. 


	24. Secret

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 24: Secret  
> Characters of Focus: Hanna-Justine, Yasmin

Hanna-Justine knows many secrets. 

She didn’t used to. Before, she was a doctor, and before that she was a student. She knew things, but they meant nothing then; what use was knowledge without someone who had the power to use it?

That had changed. When the Dark Kingdom fell, and its people fled, Hanna-Justine was there in the aftermath. She held the peoples’ shaking hands and tried to soothe the ache in their bodies and minds and souls. She tried to help and she tried to heal. She tried as hard as she could, and so she was there when the girl came.

The girl had been younger, then: short hair, soft voice, her eyes wild with loss. They called her Yasmin. The boy by her side, tight-lipped and hollow-eyed, had held onto her hand like a lifeline. They called him Dante. The girl on her other side, dark hair and a voice hoarse from singing, had smiled. They called her Ella.

Hanna-Justine had helped this wild girl just as she helped all the others. But Yasmin did not want help then. She just watched. Dark eyes and a shattered soul, and she watched. She watched Hanna-Justine work and she watched as the people around them spilled their souls, their hearts and minds and secrets. She watched. And she asked. 

“Does that happen a lot?” 

“Yes,” said Hanna-Justine, and did not think anything of it. 

Years later, when the wild girl named Yasmin became a friend and the silent people by her side became familiar, she came to Hanna-Justine again. Dark eyes, still, or perhaps just dark behind the eyes, but there was confidence in the set of her shoulders and stubbornness to her chin. Hands still soft, but her voice sharp like a blade. Her hair was longer. She spoke like a merchant but her words were something else entirely. And at the end of that meeting, that wild girl gathered her composure and said, “Will you help me?” 

“Yes,” said Hanna-Justine, and Yasmin smiled. 

Hanna-Justine knows many secrets. She travels many lands, sees many sights, discovers many mysteries. In her hands, secrets are just that—secrets. They are meaningless to her, useless in her hands. Hanna-Justine does not make a very good spy. 

But she writes letters, sometimes, in a code she created with a wild child years ago. She sends messages and she visits a little house nestled by the coast. Hanna-Justine has on use for secrets—but Yasmin, wild-eyed and sharp-minded and ruthless to the core—Yasmin does. 

And unlike Hanna-Justine, Yasmin has the power to use them. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hanna-Justine and Yasmin are both objectively "good" people, but both tend to do some... pretty morally dubious things. This is one of them. For Hanna-Justine, she is mostly focused on saving/helping others; unfortunately, she isn't one for understanding privacy and the need to keep sensitive information to herself. She's a great person, just not a very trustworthy one when it comes to secrets.


	25. Royalty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 25: Royalty  
> Character of Focus: ???

They see themselves as royalty, as kings and queens. The gods are great and the humans are worthy, and all living things have a purpose.

The creature smiles, and waits, and slinks beneath the earth. It is no matter what they think. No matter their strength or power, all things fall in the end. Kingdoms wither, and mortal creatures die.

They see themselves as royalty, but they will not be the ones crowned when the dust finally settles. 


	26. Kid

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 26: Kid  
> Character of Focus: Yasmin

“I don’t know nothing,” says the kid.

Yasmin rests a hand on her hip and raises one disbelieving eyebrow, saying nothing. The brisk coastal wind blows stray strands of hair across her hair, rustling at her long shirts, smelling strongly of salty seas. The town is lively and bustling around her, dock workers coming to and fro as they unload the latest shipment. Before her, the kid scowls, scuffing one bare food against the rough wood of the docks. 

“They got back early today,” he says finally, chewing on his lower lip and rubbing a ruddy hand under his nose. His expression is baleful.

Yasmin nods. She has noticed this too—often the fishermen and traders are out for much longer, long into the day. Recently, however, their boats have been coming back much sooner, and while Yasmin could ask around, she isn’t well-known enough in the town proper to do so without raising suspicion. One of the downsides of living closer to the countryside and farmlands than the city itself, she suspects. But then, that is why she is here.

“Do you know why?”

The kid sniffs. “Naw,” he says, but his eyes shift down to the wood planks. After a moment of silence, he looks back up and holds out his hand expectantly. “That’s it. I want my silver now, Secrets Lady.” 

Yasmin doesn’t move. “Oh, my,” she says, voice dry. “I seem to have become an alchemist, for I can feel this silver piece in my pocket turning to copper as we speak.”

The kid’s eyes go wide, and then narrow. “You can’t do that!” he says, but he glances at her pocket with something like uncertainty in his face. “Isn’t supposed to turn to gold?”

“Now now,” Yasmin says. She tilts her head. “I’m afraid those would very special circumstances indeed. But I wager you could still catch some silver.” She raises both eyebrows at him. “So what will it be, hmmm, child?”

The kid scowls back, shuffling again, and then his shoulders round up. “I meant it,” he mumbles to the ground. “They don’t tell me nothing. But…”

Yasmin waits.

“I’ve heard them talking. When it's late and they don’t remember I’m there.” His head peeks up. “They keep saying there’s something on the water. Ships that stay out late aren’t coming back.” The scowl returns. “But they won’t tell me. I wasn’t lying about that part, honest! They keep saying that if I knew I’d get my head full of—of funny ideas, or something.”

There’s something strange about his face. Yasmin studies him. “Is there anything else?”

The kid pauses. He bites his lip again, and then he says, voice halting— “There was some soldiers, too. In a ship, the other day. It was real weird, Secrets Lady, they didn’t even say hello—just stopped and sent these over to us.” He digs in his lone pocket and pulls out a crumpled wad of paper. Yasmin takes it carefully, unrolling the parchment, glancing up and down. “Can’t read it though,” says the boy. “So it meant nothing to me.”

Yasmin hums, gaze going distant, staring out over the gray line of the sea. She folds the parchment absently in half and keeps it pinned between her fingers. Then she presses her lips a thin line and sighs, and fishes out a silver coin. 

She flips the silver piece to the kid. “As agreed,” she tells him, and then, “and for your help—a secret.”

The kid looks up fast, his eyes going wide and starry. Yasmin smiles. “That sea trouble they refuse to tell you about? It is pirates.”

“ _Pirates?_ ” says the child. His whole face has lit up. “Really?”

“Yes,” Yasmin says. “And if you know what is good for you, little one, you will do your best to stay far away from them.”

“But—”

“I am a Secrets Lady for a reason,” Yasmin says, for once acknowledging the ridiculous nickname he’s given her. “Yes? So listen close, boy, and take this to heart—there’ll be no silver pieces for children taken by the thieves of the sea.”

He presses his lips together and grumps, but doesn’t argue. The silver coin clenched tight in his small fist. Yasmin gives him a placating smile and turns to go.

“Thank you for your secrets,” she says, “and enjoy the silver.” She gives him a backward wave and walks away without a second glance back. “Goodbye, child.”

“Bye, Secrets Lady!”

One day she’ll get him to stop calling her that. One day. For now Yasmin just rolls her eyes and keeps walking, musing on the information. Pirates and guards taking to the sea, and her last informant had reported foreign men—soldiers—searching the towns. But for what?

There’s too much activity for it to be simply chance. Yasmin scowls at the cobbled street and takes out the parchment again, unfolding it gingerly. A solemn and glaring face of a young boy stares back at her. Beneath his picture is a mere seven words, printed large and dark on the crumbling paper.

 

**VARIAN THE ALCHEMIST**

**Wanted Alive**

 

Yasmin looks down at the picture for a long moment. Then she folds up the parchment and keeps on walking. She knows what is happening in her own city—so now it is time to go to the root of the problem. The work of an information broker is never done.

Besides, Yasmin thinks. She’s ignored Corona for far too long already.

It's time to change that. 


	27. Weapon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 27: Weapon  
> Character of Focus: Yasmin

Yasmin is not a fighter. 

She has never been a fighter, not really; the only weapon her hands have ever held is a cooking knife, and she’d been ten years old and shaking so badly she’d dropped the knife anyway. Fighting does not come easily or naturally to her, and the idea of blood on her knuckles makes her nauseous. She cannot wield a sword or bow or staff, or throw a proper punch or kick. Even after all these years, kitchen knives are the closest she’s come to ever holding an actual weapon, and even then, she cannot summon the intent to actually go through with the deeds, danger or not.

Yasmin does not like fighting. She does not like blood, nor does she like the idea of wielding weapons with grace. She respects those that do, of course, and knows there is power to be found in physical strength—but Yasmin’s power lies not with weapons or blood, but with language, and that, she thinks, is how it should be.

Yasmin’s weapon is her words. 

The idea had come to her years ago—sitting in the back of that wagon, sneaking over a border as her homeland fell behind her. She’d looked back at a land once green and now withering, at that crumbling castle and last remaining tower, surrounded by the black rocks. She had looked back at the destruction of the only home she’d ever known, and there, alone and disgraced and broken, she’d thought— _if only I’d known._

_If only._

Her family dead, her kingdom gone, her life scattered to the winds. All the clues had been there, but back then Yasmin had not known enough to see them. She had been blind to the signs, and she had lost everything. 

And sitting there, coated in the dust and blood of a dying kingdom, Yasmin had sworn. _Next time, I’ll know._

Hanna-Justine had helped. A doctor with quick hands and a kinder heart, who had indulged Yasmin’s strange questions with barely the tick of an eyebrow. Allen, a noble man’s son in this new country—he had helped as well. Ella and Dante, always more social once the scars started to fade, did their part as well. And Yasmin began to learn. 

She learned how to read people, how to read signs, who to trust and how to make them trust her. She learned where to listen, who to ask, who was buying and selling. She learned the way of the trade. She learned how they insulted her and how they saw her, and she took a new name and gathered her allies close. She lingered at docks and chattered up the ones who had the same eyes as her. She learned to make friends from enemies and allies from demons. She learned how to speak, and soon enough, people started talking back. 

They call her Minea, in the underworld, in whispers behind her palms. Minea, the woman with a thousand spies. Minea, with her ears to the earth. Yasmin trades in secrets and she guards them closely, keeps her cards forever to her chest. She barters for information and time and company. She makes maps for Adira and sends information of new medicinal practices to Hanna-Justine. She listens and she listens and she _listens._ She knows who is with who and why, she knows who murdered the noble the last week and where he is sleeping now, she knows which country’s economy is failing and she knows how to burn a city to the ground with little more than a few well-placed words. Information brokers are always in high demand. 

Yasmin has never wielded a weapon, and that is because she has become one.  


	28. Journey

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ehh.....
> 
> Day 28: Journey  
> Characters of Focus: Addy, Elias, the Captain

They find them in the morning with the turn of the new guard shift.

The Captain himself unlocks the door, and the look he gives them both is staggering. In any other circumstance, Addy would play distraction, but for once she is silent. She feels cold, strangely cold, struck deep to her bones. She can’t breathe right. Beside her, Elias is wide-eyed and staring vacantly. Neither of them have slept a wink.

The Captain looks over them, and something uncertain flickers across his face. Whatever lecture he had planned goes unspoken. He closes his eyes and sighs, looking uncharacteristically tired, and then finally gestures both of them out from the cell.

“Looks like you two have had a bit of a journey there,” he says, not kindly not but cruel. “Maybe this will teach you not to go climbing up to the third wing prisons in the future.” For just one moment, his eyes go narrow and sharp. “Do I make myself clear?”

Neither of them answer. Addy feels as if her tongue is glued to the roof of her mouth. The whisper of their boots against the stone makes her shiver.

The Captain surveys them, but whatever he finds on their faces makes him soften. He shakes his head and sighs, and leads them from the isolation wing.

“We will discuss your punishment later,” he says finally, and gives them a sideways look. “You’re lucky that the prisoner in question is no longer in the cell, or the results would be _much_ worse.”

At this, Addy stirs. “The boy…” she says, hesitantly. “The one that attacked the castle, um—wasn’t he supposed to be there?”

The Captain doesn’t look back at her, but something in his shoulders goes stiff. “Varian,” he corrects, voice clipped. “The Princess Rapunzel took him with her on her journey to follow the black rocks. He hasn’t been here in over a month.”

There is reproach in his voice, and besides her, Elias flinches to hear it. Addy glances back at him and raises her voice, some life returning with her annoyance. “We weren’t gonna let him go or anything. We’re not stupid. We just… what he did… he hurt…” She glances at Elias again and changes her answer at the last second. “We just wanted answers.”

The Captain doesn’t say anything. Then he sighs. “And did you?”

Addy remembers whispering voices through a stone floor and shivers.

The captain shakes his head and keeps walking. He marches them past the cells rows, down the halls, through the doors. Each cell makes Addy flinch. She remembers the voice and the whispers and feels cold. Should she tell him? She thinks she should. But Addy cannot believe it herself, and she thinks— she should say something, and yet—

Her mouth stays stubbornly shut, and beside her, Elias is equally mute. In the end, neither of them say a single word.

For a brief moment, as they walk down the cold stone halls, Addy can almost see a figure—a glimpse of living shadow, eyes glowing bright and poisonous green in the darkness.

When she turns to look fully, there is nothing there. Nothing but empty cells and quiet prisoners and gray walls.

Addy shivers, and looks away. 


	29. Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 29: Past  
> Character of Focus: The Moon

Moon kneels in a crater of broken earth. _It is so bright,_ she thinks. She is dazed and dizzy and aching from head to toe. It is all she can think. The only thing that breaks through the haze of pain and grief. _It is so bright._

Impossible, too, she knows. The moondrop shines and glimmers, the light within flickering like white fire, swirling and condensing like a fog. It had just been light, before; something wispy and faint and unreal as it plummeted to the earth below. Then it hit the ground, and the earth gave way, and the dust gathered into this. A gem as bright as she is.

It is impossible, and yet, here it is. Moon is a stone being with a stone heart. She does not bleed. It should not be possible. But then, neither should a burning being cry, and the sundrop flower exists as proof that she can. And here, too, does the truth lie: a drop of Moon’s blood turned into a glowing gem.

 _Why?_ Moon thinks, and fresh pain stabs through her. She brings up a hand to her chest and feels the widening cracks beneath her fingers. She had begged, in the end. She had fallen to her knees and pleaded. She thinks she might have cried, even; stone can weep even if it cannot bleed.

But Sun—her lovely, radiant Sun—even then, she had not hesitated.

Moon kneels in a crater of broken earth, wounded and bleeding. She reaches shaking fingers for the stone—that beautiful and impossible gem, that burning drop of blood. Power untold. Power even she doesn’t understand. Blood from a stone being, tears from a creature of light and fire. Neither should exist. And yet.

 _It is so beautiful,_ Moon thinks, and a tear trails down her stone cheek. She has never hated anything more in her entire existence. She curls her hand around her moondrop and cradles it close, and there, kneeling on the earth, cracked and torn—Moon finally starts to cry. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I've mentioned before that Moon's skin is as "as dark as the black rocks"-- and that is because she IS the black rocks. Her skin is unbreakable stone. Or rather... she should have been unbreakable. (If any of you are feeling very confused on Sun and Moon's past-- it will be addressed in Labyrinths soon enough!)


	30. Future

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 30: Future  
> Characters of Focus: The Sun, Varian

**_Oh!_ **

Sun startles in surprise and peers down at the small form blocking her way, arms outstretched and back straight as if to hide Moon from view. It is a boy—a human boy, young and trembling, afraid. Of her? But why? Does he not know what sort of monster he is protecting?

Something is wrong here, but Sun doesn’t know what. Still, there is time to find out. For now— she drops her hand, fire fading from her fingertips, and smiles.

 ** _Hello there, child,_** says the Sun. ** _Now, who might you be?_**


	31. Nightmare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 31: Night  
> Characters of Focus: Sun and Moon
> 
> In a brighter world, Sun and Moon meet under a dark night sky.

There is a woman dancing on the waters.

Sun draws closer, her breath catching at the sight. The woman is unlike anything she has ever seen—beautiful and graceful, lovely and quick. She dances alone, eyes closed as if dreaming, her face serene. Her beautiful dark skin is speckled with stars, her hair soft and glowing as it twines in the air like a living thing. She is clothed in galaxies and dancing with a soft blue fog that shines soft and gentle at her touch. Her bare feet on the water creates no ripples.

Sun dares to step closer once more, drawn in by the gentle rhythm of this new stranger’s dance. Something strange flutters in her heart, a warmth that even Sun cannot name. She watches the woman dance with breathless awe. There is something like music in the air, a whisper of song. The rippling water and whistling wind, the echoes of the stars. She can feel the song of the world rise up, and she is so captivated by the woman’s dance she forgets to hold it back.

Sun closes her eyes and starts to sing, humming and then drawing breath for the stronger notes. Music swells to life around her, the fiery glow of her river of hair blinding behind her eyelids.

Abruptly she remembers herself. Sun sucks in a breath, the song fading, jolting upright when she realizes what she is doing. Her eyes snap open.

The woman has stopped dancing. She is staring at her. 

Sun colors and hides her face in her hands. “Oh!” she says, and the strange warm feeling burns low in her gut. “Oh, no, I—I didn’t mean to—” She peeks through her fingers, unable to keep herself from looking away for long. “Your dancing was just… it was beautiful. I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself.”

To her surprise, the woman smiles. She has a lovely smile, Sun thinks, a little dazed. Clear and distinct, wide and bright. It makes her whole face light up, and Sun lowers her hands from her face without thinking, her heart fluttering in her chest.

“It is all right,” says the woman. She reaches up, one hand curling in the wiping strands of her hair. “I… I do not mind the company.” Another quicksilver smile that sends warmth flooding Sun’s face. “Or your song. It was beautiful. I—I simply didn’t know anyone was…”

She trails off, and Sun see her eyes drop, her smile turning a little sheepish. Her hands are still curled in her hair.

“I am the Sun,” she says, on impulse, hardly daring to breathe. She steps forward, just on the edges of the water, light radiating out from her touch.

The woman’s bright eyes find her face again. “I am the Moon,” she offers. “Or at least, that is what they call me.”

It is beautiful, Sun thinks. A beautiful name for a beautiful stranger. She has never seen the moon before, though she has heard of her counterpart; she is nothing Sun expected and all the more glorious because of it.

“It’s… it’s very nice to meet you, Moon,” Sun says, and flushes a little. The music has faded, now that Moon is no longer dancing, but the whisper of those shining notes still lingers. “Please, may I— may I sing for you?”

Moon blinks at her, and she pauses, searching Sun’s face. Her hand falls from her hair. Something like laughter shines in her bright eyes. “May I dance for you?” she offers in turn, and her smile steals Sun’s breath away.

Sun smiles back, and feels a low flush of pleasure at the way Moon’s face darkens with a blush of her own.

“Yes,” she whispers, and there is something here—a warmth in her heart, a fluttering in her soul, a song she has never heard before this moment. She doesn’t know what it is, but she doesn’t mind it. Moon glides forward and she takes Sun’s hand without hesitation. She is cold where Sun is warm, and their palms fit neatly in the hold of the other.

“Will you dance with me, dear radiant Sun? I have yet to dance with another. I would like to try it.”

“Will you sing with me too, then?” Sun offers, beaming brightly back.

Moon smiles that same crescent smile. “But of course.”

Sun giggles, delighted at the idea. She has never danced. She has never sung with another. The possibility of both, with this woman, is enough to make her hair flare gold. The music of the world is already ringing, and her on this still water, here under this dark night sky, Sun has never felt braver.

She closes her eyes and starts to sing, and this time, a soft and echoing voice joins with her. The cold hand in hers squeezes tight, and Moon sweeps her off into a dance.  

They meet on the waters under a dark sky, a night without a moon or stars. They sing to the song of horizons and new beginnings, and dance on the roiling seas. It is the first meeting of many to come. There will be ages after this. There will be time to know—to speak, and learn, and truly know one another. There will time later to fall truly in love. But for now, on this lonely night—Sun dances and sings with Moon by her side, happiness and the beginnings of love a warm glow in her heart, and if she could live in this moment for the rest of her life, she would. 

(And the mortals will say this of them, when all is said and done: once, a long time ago, in a brighter world— once upon a time, Sun and Moon were happy.) 

**Author's Note:**

> [I am also participating in Tangledtober, which you can read here!!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16160306/chapters/37759331) Also, if you have any questions or just want to talk, [my tumblr](http://izaswritings.tumblr.com) is always open!! I love to talk about OCs or stories, so really, feel free to shoot me an ask if you have any questions at all!!
> 
> Any thoughts?


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